Research Funding
Dail Éireann — 2026-07-02
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James Lawless (FF), Kildare North

As well as matching European funding, we have surpassed it because while we drew down €1 billion in Horizon Europe funding in the current term, I have committed over €2.45 billion for research funding from State funds, so we are doing far more.
I mentioned the INSPIRE research infrastructure programme, which is a €750 million commitment to research infrastructure. I launched seven new Rinn centres, which are the Research Ireland centres, just last week. That was a €460 million investment, and those centres include things like advanced computing technology, artificial intelligence, quantum computing and big data AI. They also include things like semiconductors, biotechnology, material sciences and health informatics. There are programmes there across societal resilience and economic growth as well as the creation and pursuit of knowledge, which are fundamental goals. Those are the seven latest centres and they complement the existing centres. Overall, over 50% of the Department's national development plan, NDP, allocation has been allocated to supporting research and innovation.

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Record URI: https://data.oireachtas.ie/akn/ie/debateRecord/dail/2026-07-02/debate/main
Retrieved: 2026-08-27T06:52:14+00:00
Sitting date: 2026-07-02